1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an application platform for managing an application and an application.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is conventionally proposed a device (for example, a Multi-Function Peripheral (MFP)) capable of installing or activating an application or uninstalling the application. A device vender or a vender of a third part affiliated with the device vender sells various applications. A user purchases and installs or activates a desired application out of these applications, thereby making it possible to make use of the MFP at a mode matching for an individual user's need more appropriately.
Incidentally, since costs are minimized in designing a device, system resources (resource) such as memory devices are not affluently prepared. Therefore, there is proposed a technology where in a case of installing or activating an application, it is checked whether or not a system resource required for the application to correctly operate is ensured to prevent drawbacks or erroneous operations of the device (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2004-5419).
In the aforementioned conventional technology, in a case where a capacity of a memory required for the application to operate is analyzed at the time of installing or activating the application in the device and the device can not provide a memory having such capacity, the application is not installed or activated in the device. Here, the capacity of the memory required for the application to operate is in general the maximum amount of a resource use amount of a resource (for example, memory) consumed by the application (maximum memory use amount). That is, the maximum use amount may be the maximum amount of the memory used by the application.
Herein, a sum of maximum memory use amounts of the respective applications amounts to a huge amount and quickly results in exceeding the resource (for example, memory capacity) in the device. Therefore, the number of the applications which can be installed or activated in the device is limited to a small number.
An objective of the present invention is to solve the above problem.
For increasing the number of the applications which can be installed or activated in the device, attention can be paid on a point where all of the applications installed or activated do not use the maximum memory use amount with each other simultaneously. That is, in most cases a part of the applications uses the resource only by a used amount remarkably smaller that the maximum memory use amount.
For example, the application selected and used by a user usually uses the maximum memory use amount. On the other hand, the application which is not selected or used by the user does not use the maximum memory use amount.
That is, an operation of the application consumes much more memories at the time of displaying GUI to a user, executing a process in a device or receiving and processing a change in state of the process executed by the device.
For example, a user operates an application for a copy with a touch panel in a MFP to perform setting an indication of finish, a feeding stage or the like. In this case the application of the copy displays various pieces of information such as a drawing illustrating an output image, a drawing illustrating an outside appearance of a MFP for showing a position of a feeding stage or a display component such as a button or a list. A recent device is designed to increase a size of a display unit or be affluent with display contents for improvement on usability or improvement on attraction of the device. A greater number of memories are generally required for a display of GUI in the conventional device. In addition to it, nowadays a device is designed to increase a size of a display unit or be affluent with display contents for improvement on usability or improvement on attraction of the device, and therefore, a memory amount to be consumed has been further increasing.
In addition, in the processes of copying or production and transmission of a document in a MFP, the application operates variously in accordance with states of such processes (jobs). At this time, the application is in a state of consuming many memories for storing temporary data. In this way, the application selected and used by a user uses the maximum memory use amount.
However, the application which is not operated by a user does not need a display of GUI corresponding thereto. In addition, the process by a change in state of a device or by the device is not always executed. Therefore, the application which is not selected or used by the user does not use a memory with the maximum memory use amount.